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Gas

Hi Ladies,
This is my first post, been lurking and reading for a while. My newborn is almost 4 weeks old. He is doing well with the breast as well as expressed milk occasionally. However, recently from about five in the evening til around seven, he nurses fine, but he seems to get very fussy and gassy. I try burping him and holding him so he has pressure on his stomach, but nothing seems to work. He cries, and clenches his little fists and his belly feels rock hard. However, at some point he seems to settle down and fall asleep, and then is fine throughout the night. However, at some point during the night he lets out a TON of gas. He seems to almost struggle to get it out. I have been watching what I eat, but it does not seem to help. He has regular bowl movements and wet diapers, and is gaining ok. It just seems as though he is in so much pain with the gas. Any solutions or advice? anything would be GREATLY appreciated. Also, he spits up quite a bit, and I do burp him frequently while feeding.
Thanks in advance

Re: Gas

Re: Gas

ok well there are several things to try to help baby 'handle the flow.' Assuming nursing is comfortable for you, no need to worry about what position you nurse in. Do what works for you! If you do want to try nursing laid bck again, try nursing only SLIGHTLY laid back, like in a relaxed position leaning back against the back of your couch or rocking chair or something. No need to be lying super far back at all. Just relaxed and, perferable, not leaning/looming over baby, which can cause muscle strain in mom. Baby can be in any position but with ffld it may help if baby's head is higher than his tummy.

I suggest try some of the ideas for helping baby handle the flow in the article, but not to make any special effort to block nurse at this point. If baby prefers to nurse one side at a time, that is fine of course. Any overproduction/ffld you have appears to be fairly mild and your production will likely 'adjust' basically on it's own in the next few weeks.

Remember things like pumping and bottles may make ffld worse, pumping because it might increase production and bottles because that means baby may not nurse as often. Frequent nursing helps a lot with ffld.

But the fussiness may not be related to ffld at all. Some babies just have a particularly fussy time, usually in the evening and while very upsetting, it's almost always a temporary situation and after a few or several weeks disappears as mysteriously as it began. I am sure other moms here will have tips on how to handle this in the meantime!